Wasn't this tried before?

[aaronread]

I have no idea what Mr. Savage makes when it comes to a salary, but I know from people who are familiar with him say that he doesn't spend his most of his time sitting being a plush desk in a building paid for with taxpayer's money, attends wine and cheese fundraisers, or drives around in a company-paid for SUV. Nope he actually works for a living!

I'd like to contrast this with Norm Silverstein, as I'm sure was the original post's intent. And since I don't want to single out Norm, I'll add that Norm is interchangeable with at least a dozen other pubradio GM's in this narrow context: they're not hired to be General Managers, they're hired to be fundraisers. Their job is to go out and work the high-value crowd and convince them to write big checks to the station. One does not hobnob with the rich on the cheap; if you want to play in that crowd, you've got to be in that crowd. And if you want to convince that crowd that you have your act together, you've got to have someone in charge who's paid a lot of money.

Without putting too many words into Bob Savage's mouth, I opine that he is a General Manager. Not a fundraiser. Very different kettle of fish. And perfectly appropriate since while WXXI depends on close relationships with very wealthy people (or people who control a lot of wealth at a foundation or company), WYSL does not. Their business model is different, thus the person in charge is different.

The idea of a "President as fundraiser" is increasingly common in the non-profit world. Many colleges, as have many hospitals, and other large non-profit organizations, have embraced the idea where point is that you find someone who's got a fat rolodex filled with rich and powerful people, you pay that person a "lavish" salary to draw them in and keep them in the scotch-n-scones needed to hobnob in that crowd...and you turn 'em loose to stick a vacuum into that rolodex and suck as much money out as you can.

By all rights, Norm has been very successful at convincing major donors to give a lot of money to WXXI. I'm not saying that justifies his "lavish" salary. It doesn't, because it's irrelevant...it only justifies that he gets a salary in the first place (i.e. he keeps his job because he's good at it). What justifies his "lavish" salary is that if you want to mingle with the rich, you have to be rich yourself. Major donors look at Norm's salary and they think: "WXXI can afford to pay their President that much money, that means they must have their act together, and therefore they are worthy of my support."

That's just how the modern-day fundraising system works; in a sense, Norm's salary and perks are basically no different than how I get a free cellphone from my company because I'm technically on-call 24/7. It's a tool that comes with the job. A very nice tool, but a tool nonetheless.

 

[Savage]

Sooo....welcome to the first-ever WYSL Annual Pledge Drive!

Donate $1000 - get your choice of HD Radios. You can pick from Zune HD, Insignia portable, or Boat Anchor....no, I mean BA Receptor HD.

Step up, gents! Support the conservative programming I know you love! Give....to Whistle! "We'll hiss you uuuupp!"

 

[The Voice of Reason]

I'd like to contrast this with Norm Silverstein, as I'm sure was the original post's intent. And since I don't want to single out Norm, I'll add that Norm is interchangeable with at least a dozen other pubradio GM's in this narrow context: they're not hired to be General Managers, they're hired to be fundraisers. Their job is to go out and work the high-value crowd and convince them to write big checks to the station. One does not hobnob with the rich on the cheap; if you want to play in that crowd, you've got to be in that crowd. And if you want to convince that crowd that you have your act together, you've got to have someone in charge who's paid a lot of money.

Without putting too many words into Bob Savage's mouth, I opine that he is a General Manager. Not a fundraiser. Very different kettle of fish. And perfectly appropriate since while WXXI depends on close relationships with very wealthy people (or people who control a lot of wealth at a foundation or company), WYSL does not. Their business model is different, thus the person in charge is different.

The idea of a "President as fundraiser" is increasingly common in the non-profit world. Many colleges, as have many hospitals, and other large non-profit organizations, have embraced the idea where point is that you find someone who's got a fat rolodex filled with rich and powerful people, you pay that person a "lavish" salary to draw them in and keep them in the scotch-n-scones needed to hobnob in that crowd...and you turn 'em loose to stick a vacuum into that rolodex and suck as much money out as you can.
By all rights, Norm has been very successful at convincing major donors to give a lot of money to WXXI. I'm not saying that justifies his "lavish" salary. It doesn't, because it's irrelevant...it only justifies that he gets a salary in the first place (i.e. he keeps his job because he's good at it). What justifies his "lavish" salary is that if you want to mingle with the rich, you have to be rich yourself. Major donors look at Norm's salary and they think: "WXXI can afford to pay their President that much money, that means they must have their act together, and therefore they are worthy of my support."
That's just how the modern-day fundraising system works; in a sense, Norm's salary and perks are basically no different than how I get a free cellphone from my company because I'm technically on-call 24/7. It's a tool that comes with the job. A very nice tool, but a tool nonetheless.


So in other words you are justifying Silverstein's six-figure salary because he needs to make big money in order to entice wealthy individuals to contribute to WXXI?

Sorry I just don't support your theory because if that were the case then the people on the air, or behind the scenes helping to create local programs (what few there are), should also be receiving large salaries because they are responsible for the product that the public gets to see and hear on a daily basis. Without those talented folks there wouldn't be any viewers or listeners.

It's highly unlikely that he spends any of his personal money to wow potential wealthy donors either. Most likely that expense is covered by some general fund the station has.

If, according to you, Silverstein's main goal is targeting the rich and famous, then why should every taxpayers help fund public broadcasting? Let those with money contribute voluntarily instead of every taxpayer having to donate, even if they don't want to.

 

[The Voice of Reason]

Sooo....welcome to the first-ever WYSL Annual Pledge Drive!

Donate $1000 - get your choice of HD Radios. You can pick from Zune HD, Insignia portable, or Boat Anchor....no, I mean BA Receptor HD.

Step up, gents! Support the conservative programming I know you love! Give....to Whistle! "We'll hiss you uuuupp!"

Excellent ;D

 

[Element9]

This thread should have been sent to Ignoristan about two pages ago, but since the table has been re-set by aaronread, it's become viable. 'Read's analysis is more in line with reality these days and unfortunately it's a very sad commentary on the state of pub radio/tv. As such, pub GMs are high priced pimps ("Diamond in the back, sun roof top, digging' the scene with a gangsta lean, ooo, oooo") lacking only the velvet suits and broad brim hats, whose job is to collar the big corporate fish: the banks that have been bailed out by the public, insurance companies that are driving the cost of health care through the roof and not-for-profit caretaker agencies whose CEOs have equally high paying positions. The pub GMs leave the groveling to the on-air personnel, whose job is to break into a James Taylor-CCR-60s special and try to convince the average listener/viewer to come up with $60-$120 a year for a membership.

You do realize that this is an art form, don't you? And like so many forms of art, it's shelf life is limited. Sorta like AM radio. It has perhaps 10 years remaining. Youth shall be served. They don't watch PBS as much as the 45+ crowd, just as they don't listen to AM radio. So the shucking and shilling serves a purpose now, but the clock is most definitely ticking. These guys are in a race to collect their retirement checks and TIA-CREF benefits. It's the way of the world, just as CEOs in the private sector are scrambling to cash out. It's all about the exit plan. In other words, VOR, this is the way it is. What is it that you don't get?

This message board is read by about 30 people in or on the periphery of the business. Why not attend WXXI public board meetings and calmly and rationally articulate your discontent.

You can write letters to WXXI. Refine and discipline your writing style. Use short, well-constructed declarative sentences written in active tense. Subject-verb-object. Use spell-check, but don't rely on it. Grace Mr. Silverstein with one well-written, signed letter each week, noting that all authentic letters must be placed in the station's public file.

Visit the station quarterly and ask to view the public file during regular business hours. Look presentable. Wear a suit. Polish your shoes. Say little, be professional, act businesslike, say "please" and "thank you." Do not raise your voice, as the loudest man in the room is the weakest man in the room. After about three visits, certain people will note your presence.

Another option is to "go Michael Moore." Get extreme. Buy a camera. Secure a url. Create a website with a short, catchy name. Trail the perp. Expose the inequities.

The third option is a bit more covert and insidious. You can actually befriend Mr. Silverstein, cultivate a friendship over time and like Cassius or Don Corleone dispatch him (although not in the physical sense.)

Cheers!

 

[SirRoxalot]

Public broadcasting need only look at Howard Stern to see its future. Remember when Stern was on terrestrial radio, and was the foundation of numerous stations around the country? 95X in Syracuse leaned heavily on Howard, just as most public stations lean heavily on syndicated programming from NPR/PBS.

Howard cut a deal and went direct. Satellite was his medium of choice, but that was before the Internet was able to deliver rich media on demand. During the latest round of negotiations, he threw that option at Mel Karmazin, and both of them came to agreement that the time to go all web wasn't here yet, but you can see that train a-comin'.

NPR and PBS at some point are going to go directly to the customer. You can already download podcasts and listen live on NPR. Ditto PBS. They're effectively bypassing local stations already - even though local statons are the money pump that pays for producing that programming. As the younger, more technically oriented, and "everything should be free" generation grows, what's going to happen to revenue - either local or national? They won't care what the source is as long as they can get the programming they want on demand. Local stations are going to have to produce something that their customers want, or they're going to be bypassed.

 

[audio4tv]

There is a big difference between Stern and public media. Public TV and Radio is similar to the BBC, CBC, and other broadcasters worldwide. Each has a different flavor, in terms of its execution in that country. They are supported different ways, but most have a good chunk of government funding, more per capita than ever in this country. Considering the public service nature of the programming as a whole, I don't see the true comparison. It is "public media", not commercially sponsored and supported media. Could there be an allowance to operate like the BBC and CBC, and allow "commercial" content with public and governmnt support? I highly doubt the NAB and commercial broadcasters would allow it. Even comments posted here already by local station individuals show that this would not be desirable, as there is an objection to underwriting on public media.

 

[Savage]

Audio, you've made an excellent point here. I honestly think that's the objective of public broadcasting in this country, which is already morphing more and more into an American BBC.

The question is: with 900 channels on cable and satellite plus free OTA commercial TV and radio - plus we don't need to pay license fees for receivers - does the USA want or need taxpayer-supported broadcasting?

Electronic media are supposed to be the eternal watchdogs of what government is up to. If government is funding radio and TV - especially something resembling a "national service" a la BBC - I see that as a troubling conflict of interest. Pubcasters already owe a significant portion of their existence to government and the trend is increasing.

 

[Lee Rust]

American BBC? That's an antique idea. Get with it. Follow the market. Set some trends. Loosen up.

Just think.. Real-time reality fund raising.. Norm could be a big star like Howard Stern, not just some boring suit who only shows up for pledge drives. Make him earn that fat paycheck and fancy car. How about an online 'NormCam' to track every clandestine trip to Oak Hill? Link it to the WXXI website or Facebook page and send out a Tweet every time one of his shots ends up in the rough or he gets a big clubhouse pledge from some Pittsford swell. Before long, a crowd would gather around whenever he shopped at Wegmans, waving at the camera and holding up signs for the folks at home. Just like the 'Today' show.

Seriously, Aaron and Element9 are stating the obvious. Mr. Silverstein's principal task is to continuously scheme and beg for money, and he apparently does it well. As with lawyers and plumbers, he's nicely paid, because most people would rather not do tedious and undignified things on a daily basis without proper compensation.

If we whole-heartedly supported our public broadcasting services, then Norm's salary and position would be unnecessary. Since we only fractionally support public broadcasting, operating funds must be laboriously scraped together from a variety of sources.

For liberals, CPB, PBS and NPR are a high water mark of American civic achievement and journalistic standards. For conservatives, they are a socialistic blight on the airwaves and a waste of public money that is patently unfair to commercial broadcasters. For many us, they remain a reliable and professional source for the in-depth news and cultural programming that commercial channels increasingly avoid.

With the rightward tilt of our political landscape and the downward slide of the economy, public media funding levels have trended ever lower and may eventually disappear altogether. At that point, the need for an executive acting in the role of Mr. Silverstein will be absolute.

 

[Bob1370]

"The question is: with 900 channels on cable and satellite plus free OTA commercial TV and radio - plus we don't need to pay license fees for receivers - does the USA want or need taxpayer-supported broadcasting?"

I hate to say this, since I'm certainly proud of my past work for stations like WBEN, WKBW and WHEN...but I'm afraid the direction commercial broadcasting has taken in the last 20 years is what made public radio necessary, and what has made it popular with listeners even as it struggles financially.

Commercial broadcasting used to pride itself on thoroughness, inclusiveness, coverage of all sides of an issue in as much depth as the format would allow (which in the case of WBEN, which offered news blocks of 15 to 60 minutes in length, was quite a lot). Unfortunately, how many station owners are as insistent on quality and depth as Larry Levite was, and how many news and program directors are as insistent on precision, accuracy and fairness as Jim McLaughlin and Bob Wood?

The silence on that question speaks volumes...firms like Clear Channel gave public radio its reason for being with its partisan, loud, nasty approach to radio...that made people who want to learn and hear all sides look for a place to go and find it only in the noncomm realm. Didn't used to be that way. I wonder what Jack Slattery and George Haefner would think if they were to come back and listen to what WHAM has become after 10 AM every day...

 

[Savage]

If the public's support for "public" broadcasting is chronically insufficient as Lee claims, it's hard to see why "operating funds must be laboriously scraped from a variety of sources" including the wallets of hard-pressed taxpayers, many of whom apparently have little interest in it.

Look, if there isn't enough money to run public broadcasting the way they want to run it, they can do what every other broadcaster does - namely, scale your operations and programming to the funds which ARE available. You know: "live within your means?" That's the real world. The rest of us live in it. It's time for pubcasters to do the same, instead of forcing Bob Savage (driver of a 4-cylinder Jeep Patriot) to pay for limos for high-roller fundraising executives.

As far as the demonization of commercial broadcasting goes, merit is in the eye - and ear - of the beholders. The marketplace has determined that much-vilified Rush Limbaugh, Ryan Secrest and (horrors!) some "Savage" guy are successful to the tune of tens of millions of listeners. That means they're the marketplace winners. If public radio's weekly audience is as large as they claim, it ought to be "shooting fish in a barrel" for them to extract the necessary support from all those listeners.....and if not, run their network more economically without using government to extract addition support from those who don't find merit in the programming.

As explored earlier in this thread, I'm not getting further into the debate about how one political viewpoint or another is the correct one or the humane one or whatever. If I happen to enjoy comedies at the movies, that doesn't mean that your choice of teen slasher flicks is any less valid. We all like what we like.....movies, food, music, women or radio formats.

 

[Savage]

Bob1370, with respect: any time I venture into the "good old days" of radio on this board, I generally get drowned out by opprobrious hoots (SEE, Lee Rust's jocular previous post.) I feel propelled to do likewise concerning your observations about commercial radio.

If there was a need for Jack-and-George, it would still exist in the media marketplace today. I share your nostalgia for days of yore, as my mentor in this business was Bill Givens. Mike Morgan (another storied Elmiran) was our news director at WYSL for the first ten years of our existence. I loved their heyday of broadcasting (which overlapped my first decades in radio, BTW.)

But Slattery and Haefner's salad days bracketed a time when there were between 3000 and 7000 radio stations in the US, most markets had two or three TV stations, cable was small-town and entrepreneurial and there was no satellite anything, nor any Internet. That's all changed - in some ways in a good way, and others otherwise. Radio has become what needs to be in response to market forces. It's nobody's fault, it's just the way it is.

Commercial radio doesn't have the luxury of living in an open-ended world in terms of expectations, and all I'm saying is that an entitlement culture in any enterprise - pubcasting included - is rapidly being debunked by modern-day realities.

Please don't shoot the messenger here. I wish my colleagues in public radio well.

 

[Lee Rust]

"...firms like Clear Channel gave public radio its reason for being with its partisan, loud, nasty approach to radio...that made people who want to learn and hear all sides look for a place to go and find it only in the noncomm realm. Didn't used to be that way. I wonder what Jack Slattery and George Haefner would think if they were to come back and listen to what WHAM has become after 10 AM every day...

Jack Slattery & George Haefner were creatures of their historical period, along with the staff and management of WHAM, plus the radio listeners and market of mid-20th century Rochester. I'm sure that Jack & George would be puzzled and dismayed by the mass media climate of today, but their time has passed. The programming we hear now on the commercial channels is a direct reflection of major changes within the larger cultural marketplace. For the minority among us who still seek decorous civility in media discourse, there are still a few places to turn, including public radio & TV.

Yes, NPR, PBS and their station affiliates might eventually have to "live within their means" via direct audience support, and if they did there's no doubt that the quantity and quality of their offerings would be diminished. Until then, they will continue to try to play the money game under the current rules, which still include a measure of public funding.

For commercial broadcasters, the rules of the money game have already changed. It's debatable as to whether Limbaugh, Seacrest and the other "Savage" represent the causes or the effects of those changes in the game.

 

[The Voice of Reason]

Jack Slattery & George Haefner were creatures of their historical period, along with the staff and management of WHAM, plus the radio listeners and market of mid-20th century Rochester. I'm sure that Jack & George would be puzzled and dismayed by the mass media climate of today, but their time has passed. The programming we hear now on the commercial channels is a direct reflection of major changes within the larger cultural marketplace. For the minority among us who still seek decorous civility in media discourse, there are still a few places to turn, including public radio & TV.

Even public radio has lost a few icons. For example the retirements of Simon Pontin and Mordecai Lipschultz on WXXI-FM.
Plus I still miss Bob Edwards on Morning Edition.

The era of Jack and George has long since passed. Now the question is what does the future bode for radio? With younger people ignoring radio as a means of entertainment and information, that leaves "baby boomers." Unfortunately the Madison Avenue geniuses desire a certain age group in order to sell advertising. There is an interesting report recently released by an economist out in the mid west who wrote that it's the "Baby Boomers" who are not only listening to radio and watching TV but trends show they are also purchasing products because, unlike their children, they are not in debt, nor have mortgages and young children to worry about. Tell me ever see a 20 + something driving around in a Cadillac SUV? I've seen people a lot older than me driving around in those vehicles.

 

[Red1]

No, VOR is the alter-ego of a former WXXI employee with an axe to grind. This person uses his real name in some posts and VOR when he wants to say things he doesn't want attributed to him. I found this out when I innocently gave him with some info which subsequently ended up posted on this board in the same form that I provided it. As a former WXXI employee who left in less than happy circumstances myself, I have no reason to defend Norm Silverstein or WXXI but I do appreciate the service it performs and the product it puts out.

 

[listener-in]

I wonder what Jack Slattery and George Haefner would think if they were to come back and listen to what WHAM has become after 10 AM every day...

Amen. And WHAM's management maybe don't understand that what it has become after 10 AM is precisely the reason that many potential listeners lost the habit of tuning in and supporting the station before 10 AM. As recently as the area's notable ice storms of the last few years, the station provided a wonderful service to listeners. Now, much of the capability and the ethical grounding that made it happen has been allowed to atrophy to the point that it would have a hard time delivering such service in the event of another major event of that kind. How sad. As I've mentioned before, the managers of any station should ask themselves if they would dare talk to their neighbors in the offensive their overpaid talkers perform over the air.